THE (NEVER-ENDING) SEARCH FOR SPEED

With a wish list of equipment, wind-tunnel time and aero expertise at his disposal, can editor Simon Richardson go quicker still?

- Simon Richardson

Last year I set out on a project to get aero on a budget. With an old frame, some borrowed equipment and a couple of items of test kit, I built a TT bike and adjusted my position to get as aerodynamic as possible. The whole set-up cost less than £200 and led to a set-up cost less than £200 and led to a significant improvement over previous TT times set on a drop-barred road bike.

This year the natural progression was to see if and how I could take it to the next level. To find even more speed. With a better position and better kit would the improvements continue in a linear fashion and see me post ever faster times? That was the hope. But little did I know things were about to get complicated.

First up, the kit. This was in fact the easy part. I knew Specialized had a Shiv in my size that was gathering dust in a pro rider’s garage, and a loan of a bike that is known to test exceptionally well in all scenarios was the perfect start. I’d kit it out with a SR AM Red eTap one-by groupset and there’d be no stopping me.

Building the bike was relatively simple, even the oft-troublesome internal routing for the disc brakes was straightforward. The eTap bar buttons were easy to locate and feed through to the brain sitting under the stem, while the wireless blips can go almost anywhere. Wireless set-ups, where you’re able to place gearchange buttons exactly where your hands sit, are perfect for TT bikes for which holding a set position is everything.